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Fluttering Souls is a captivating, beautifully illustrated two-player game based on the Japanese legend of The White Butterfly. You will compete to collect a kaleidoscope of butterflies in the hope of being visited by The White Butterfly; the soul of a lost loved one.
Legend of the White Butterfly
Many years ago an apprentice merchant named Takahama fell hopelessly in love with a woman named Akiko. They became engaged, but, tragically, Akiko died before they could be wed.
Takahama was distraught. He had built a life and a successful career, but he could not bear to be away from his love. Such was his dedication to Akiko that he abandoned his trade and gave his life to the upkeep of the cemetery where she was buried.
For 50 years Takahama visited Akiko’s grave every day with a single pure white rose. One day, Takahama fell so ill he could not go outside. Fearing he may die, his sister and niece came to care for him. While he lay there, unable to move, a butterfly of the purest white landed gently on his pillow. Annoyed, Takahama’s niece tried to shoo the butterfly, but it would not stray from the pillow of the dying man.
As Takahama’s final breath left his body, so the butterfly flew to the grave of Akiko and disappeared. White butterflies are believed to be the visiting souls of loved ones. Worried that Takahama had not visited her grave that day; Akiko looked over him and did not leave until his soul had joined hers.
Overview
Fluttering Souls is a 2 player game, made up of 3 - 5 rounds. In each round players take turns collecting butterflies to earn victory points, either in a set or by themselves. The player that collects the most victory points at the end of a round is awarded a White Butterfly Token; a visit from a lost loved one. The first player to collect 3 White Butterfly Tokens is the winner.
—description from the publisher
Fluttering Souls
- Wonderful two-player game
- Plays very quick rounds
- Fun and clever
- Can be played almost anywhere
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Blocking — whoever holds this can play it as a blocking move. So, you're kind of forcing your opponent into what they can take because you've now blocked some things.
- Card Drafting — Whoever is first player gets to pick one available card, and whoever is second player gets to start with the great eggfly... So, if I were first, I think I'm going to take this one... and then the other person gets to go. So, let's say they choose to take this blue morpho. They then flip up a card because it's now free and you can only take cards that are free.
- Set Collection — Each card that is on here scores in different ways. So, it shows you on the card how many of that card there are... how you can use them to score.
- Tiebreaker — at the end of the round, whoever holds this will win any ties.
- variable setup — you have different layout cards that you're going to use. So, each round is going to be set up differently. So, for this round, it is going to look like this.
- wild card — The swallow tail works essentially as a wild. Every two of them you can count as another type of card.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- And it's just a really fun, clever game.
- You can play quickly. You can play it just about anywhere.
- And I am having a great time with it.
References (from this video)
- Captivating and beautifully illustrated
- Has a layer of strategy
- Loved ones coming back from the grave and visiting family members on the wings of white butterflies, based on a Japanese tale.
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Card Drafting — Players are only able to take open cards, forcing opponents into a corner.
- set collecting — Players are trying to collect butterflies worth the most points.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- Fluttering Souls by Nurse Chad Games
- it's a captivating beautifully illustrated two-player game
- it's based on the white butterfly a legend Japanese tale about loved ones coming back from the grave and visiting family members on the wings of white butterflies
- it's going to be out on the 5th of Feb
References (from this video)
- Captivating and beautifully illustrated
- Deep theme
- Collecting butterflies to score points, inspired by a Japanese tale about loved ones returning.
- Based on the white butterfly legend, a Japanese tale about loved ones coming back from the grave and visiting family members on the wings of white butterflies.
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Set Collection — You're trying to collect butterflies worth the most amount of points with the goal of touching there or getting in contact with a white butterfly or white butterfly token.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- I on Tarrant University reporting from pax Melbourne Australia 2018 stay tuned for our summary of some interviews with what's upcoming in the Australian boy gaming community
- everything in table tops from dice the board games new board games that's come out coming out speaking to the game designers point game shots everything you get almost everything that you can think of about board game
- It's a captivating beautifully illustrated two-player game.
- That sounds quite deep
- It's a worker placement engine builder
- Skywards is a city building and contracting game for two to four players you're competing to build the nicest city in the brand-new f1 city of Skyway and skyward Republic is two years on everybody's built a nice functional flying city and then wondering how to make it really really good and what they should do next
References (from this video)
- Light complexity
- Simple drafting with some strategy
- Variety of layout cards (15 different layouts)
- Butterfly-themed scoring variation by type
- butterfly collection and scoring
- butterfly-themed with inspiration from Japanese legend
- Seven Wonders
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Card Drafting — players take turns selecting cards from a layout
- Compound Scoring — different butterfly types have different scoring values
- layout reveal — cards are laid out and revealed as top cards become available; a card becomes usable when uncovered
- randomized layout — layout cards are drawn randomly to determine the arrangement
- round-based play — the game is structured into three to five rounds
- scoring by butterfly types — different butterfly types have different scoring values
- Set Collection — players collect butterfly cards to score points
- Simultaneous Reveal — cards are laid out and revealed as top cards become available; a card becomes usable when uncovered
- tie-break via white butterfly tokens — white butterfly tokens break ties; whoever gets three first wins
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- the game is of light complexity
- it's a nice simple drafting game with a little bit of strategy involved
- the strategy is trying to think ahead which card you are going to take and getting the order right and which card your opponent is going to take next
- Blue Morpho gives you four points if you collect three and none if you don't
- 15 different layout cards to give more varieties
- two players with mechanics such as set collection and card drafting